Monday, September 15, 2008

Since I couldn't get Labor Day off, I decided to quit my job, just so that I could participate in any local Labor Day festivities like a normal American. I knew this decision would come back to haunt me, and soon at that—probably Tuesday morning. I didn't care. Tuesday morning, though just four days away, seemed a long way off. I looked for it outside my window at work on Friday morning, but all I saw was the same silver skyscraper I'd seen out my window every day since I'd started working there. (Well, not every day. There was a period of two weeks in March last year when I'd turned my desk around so that my back was to the window. I switched it back when I grew frustrated at the way the sun would hit my computer screen in the late afternoon.) At lunch on Friday I sneaked a cardboard box out of the supply room and brought it back to my office, where I filled it with my personal possessions. The box wasn't even half full when I finished, so I threw in the many boxes of staples and paper clips that for some reason I'd stocked up on during my first few days on the job.

Box in hand, I stood at my door and took one last look at the room, saluted it, then turned off the light and headed out. No one I passed in the halls asked about the box.

As soon as I made it to the street, I walked in the direction of South Street and the East River. Along the way, a street performer was doing a magic trick for an audience of about two dozen tourists. I walked behind the tourists in order not to ruin the entertainment. As I crossed South Street and reached the edge of the pier, I couldn't help noticing how tall I'd grown since aging from a child into an adult. I leaned over the railing. A slack rope strung between two posts was busy dipping itself into and out of the indifferent water. The rope and the posts were also indifferent. I lifted the box over the railing and let it drop.

That night I cooked some spaghetti and watched a few hours of PBS, all the while monitoring a bump on the back of my neck that I feared might be cancer.